STUDIO GHIBLI MEETS ISABEL ALLENDE IN MAGICAL MULTIMEDIA THEATRE SHOW
International award-winning Japanese performance artist and musician Sachie Mikawa brings Fish Saw to Wellington and Auckland March - April 2023
Created by a team of artists from Japan, Argentina, and the USA, Fish Saw, with its original animation and musical score, tells a story of an eccentric family, an incredible natural disaster and how to deal with what's left.
Fish Saw, written by Sachie Mikawa and George Lewis and performed by Sachie, premiered in Buenos Aires, Argentina in May 2017. This poignant and funny solo show is based on Sachie's real family in Japan and deeply inspired by the devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
Sachie says, “On March 11, 2011, one of the biggest earthquakes ever recorded in history hit my hometown, Sendai, Japan. Knowing where my family lived, less than 80 feet from the water, I was so sure that I had lost my mom and my sister to the tsunami. Though miraculously both of them survived after missing for three days, we lost several family members who were very close to us. Fish Saw is a universal story of family and love that I created with my mentor and long-time collaborator George Lewis, to help me process this traumatic event”.
Set in an old brothel and legendary noodle shop by the sea, Fish Saw takes the audience to the mid-1950s and present day Japan, with its touching intergenerational tale. There’s a love story, a clown, life and death and a good amount of noodles.
Fish Saw has performed in several festivals around the world to much acclaim, and won Outstanding Technical Achievement, London Fringe. Due to COVID lockdowns, it has never played a full season in New Zealand yet, despite Sachie and her partner and co-producer Trent H Baumann living in Wellington since 2018.
Dr Sally Richards, Festival Director of the TAHI New Zealand Festival of Solo Performance 2020 said of the single NZ performance of Fish Saw, “I was entirely enchanted by the magical quality and poignancy of the show. It has broad appeal and it is utterly unique.”
With beguiling music, humour, magical realism and a talking fish, Sachie Mikawa and her international team of artists will finally present the touching and poetic Fish Saw to New Zealand audiences.
Fish Saw plays at Bats Theatre in Pōneke 28 March - 1 April and Basement Theatre in Tāmaki Makaurau 4 - 6 April.
Tickets for both seasons are now on sale.
“This adorable little show, about a family who survives a tsunami in Japan, is weird-artsy as all get-out, and charming to boot.”
“A beautiful, funny, tragic and touching show about the endurance of memory in the face of human mortality”
Fish Saw by Sachie Mikawa and George Lewis
Produced by Monfu
Directed by: George Lewis
Cast: Sachie Mikawa
Animation by: Sandra Iurcovich and Andrea Torti
Costume Design: Ana Franca
Composer and Sound Design: Sachie Mikawa
